New Zealand

Not sure if you caught the story out of New Zealand… but their latest refuge is now home bound. “Happy Feet,” a young Emperor penguin, recently washed up on their shores, 2,500 miles from home. Happy had become somewhat of a celebrity in New Zealand. But that is all coming to an end on August 29th as he will be heading home aboard a research vessel that was heading toward his subantartic neighborhood… and decided to give him a lift.

Reuters reports that a Wellington Zoo veterinarian will accompany the penguin, which will be housed in a crate designed by Wellington Zoo staff to keep it cool and comfortable during the voyage. It will be fitted with a GPS tracker that will allow fans to monitor its progress on several websites, www.sirtrack.com and www.ourfarsouth.org.” They also reported: “Penguins normally eat snow to stay hydrated but veterinarians believe Happy Feet, named after the main character in a popular animated film, became confused and ate sand instead.” (Reporting by Elaine Lies, editing by Miral Fahmy)

I got to thinking of my passage from Colossians as I read this recent article. Colossians 3:2 reads: 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. The New Testament frequently reminds us that as believers we are now citizens of another world. Our hearts are to be desiring our true home. Our minds are to be focused on it.

But like this penguin, sometimes we end up a little off course. We are stranded on the shores of a land far from home. We have since tasted what this world has to offer and have mistakenly come to prefer it… trading snow for sand. We need daily to have our heads examined… to have them refocused on our Homeland.

Through prayer, study, meditation and solitude… we retrain our minds. We don’t allow them to be reshaped into the image this world holds as ideal. We are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. Someday we will take that journey home… the angels will be heading toward our eternal neighborhood… and they will be glad to give us a lift. But in the meantime, we enjoy the ride. And learn to be happy.